Folk music[edit]

For much of its history, Australia's bush music belonged to an oral and folkloric tradition, and was only later published in print in volumes such as Banjo Paterson's Old Bush Songs, in the 1890s. The distinctive themes and origins of Australia's "bush music" or "bush band music" can be traced to the songs sung by the convicts who were sent to Australia during the early period of the British colonisation, beginning in 1788. Early Australian ballads sing of the harsh ways of life of the epoch and of such people and events as bushrangers, swagmen, drovers, stockmen and shearers. Convict and bushranger verses often railed against government tyranny. Classic bush songs on such themes include: The Wild Colonial Boy, Click Go The Shears, The Eumeralla Shore, The Drover's Dream, The Queensland Drover, The Dying Stockman and Moreton Bay.[10]

Later themes which endure to the present include the experiences of war, of droughts and flooding rains, of Aboriginality and of the railways and trucking routes which link Australia's vast distances. Isolation and loneliness of life in the Australian bush has been another theme.

Australia has a unique tradition of folk music, with origins in both the indigenous music traditions of the original Australian inhabitants, as well as the introduced folk music (including sea shanties) of 18th and 19th century Europe. Celtic, English, German and Scandinavian folk traditions predominated in this first wave of European immigrant music. The Australian tradition is, in this sense, related to the traditions of other countries with similar ethnic, historical and political origins, such as New Zealand, Canada, and the United States. The Australian indigenous tradition brought to this mix novel elements, including new instruments, some of which are now internationally familiar, such as the didgeridoo of Northern Australia.

A number of British singers have spent periods in Australia and have included Australian material in their repertoires, e.g. A. L. Lloyd, Martin Wyndham-Read and Eric Bogle.

Folk revival[edit]

Notable Australian exponents of the folk revival movement included both European immigrants such as Eric Bogle, noted for his sad lament to the battle of Gallipoli "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda", and indigenous Australians like Archie Roach and Paul Kelly. Kelly's lyrics capture the vastness of the culture and landscape of Australia by chronicling life about him for over 30 years. David Fricke from Rolling Stone calls Kelly "one of the finest songwriters I have ever heard, Australian or otherwise.". In the 1970s, Australian Folk Rock brought both familiar and less familiar traditional songs, as well as new compositions, to live venues and the airwaves. Notable artists include The Bushwacker Band and Redgum. Redgum are known for their 1983 anti-war protest song "I Was Only Nineteen", which peaked at #1 on the National singles charts. The 1990s brought Australian Indigenous Folk Rock to the world, led by bands including Yothu Yindi. Australia's long and continuous folk tradition continues strongly to this day, with elements of folk music still present in many contemporary artists including those generally thought of as Rock, Heavy Metal and Alternative Music. Gold coast musician Mark Boulle is pioneering the way with his original Indie Folk music. This truly Australian sound continues to add to the strong tradition of folk based music coming out from down under.

Popular music[edit]

Country music[edit]

Australia has a long tradition of country music, which has developed a style quite distinct from its US counterpart. The early roots of Australian country are related to folk traditions of Ireland, England, Scotland and many diverse nations. "Botany Bay" from the late 19th century is one example. Waltzing Matilda, often regarded by foreigners as Australia's unofficial national anthem, is a quintessential Australian country song, influenced more by Celtic folk ballads than by American Country and Western music. This strain of Australian country music, with lyrics focusing on strictly Australian subjects, is generally known as "bush music" or "bush band music." The most successful Australian bush band is Melbourne's The Bushwackers, active since the early 1970s.

Children's music remained a relatively small segment of the Australian music industry until the emergence of groundbreaking children's group The Wiggles in the late 1990s. The multi-award-winning four-piece group rapidly gained international popularity in the early 2000s and by the end of the decade they had become one of the most popular children's groups in the world. The Wiggles now boasts a huge fanbase in many regions including Australasia, Britain, Asia, and the Americas.

In 2008 The Wiggles were named Business Review Weekly's top-earning Australian entertainers for the fourth year in a row having earned A$45 million in 2007.[14] They have been called "the world's biggest preschool band" and "your child's first rock band".[15] The group has achieved worldwide success with their children's albums, videos, television series, and concert appearances. They have earned seventeen gold, twelve platinum, three double-platinum, and ten multi-platinum awards for sales of over 17 million DVDs and four million CDs.[16]

By 2002, The Wiggles had become the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's (ABC) most successful pre-school television program. They have performed for over 1.5 million children in the US between 2005 and 2008.[17] They have won APRA song writing awards for Best Children's Song three times and earned ADSDA's award for Highest Selling Children's Album four times.[16] They have been nominated for ARIA's Best Children's Album award fourteen times, and won the award eight times.[18] In 2003, they received ARIA's Outstanding Achievement Award for their success in the U.S.[16]

R&B and soul music[edit]

R&B and soul music had a significant impact on Australian popular music, although it is notable that many seminal recordings in this genre by American acts of the late 20th century were not played on Australian radio. Anecdotal evidence suggest that racism was a key factor—in his book on the history of Australian radio, author and broadcaster Wayne Mac recounts that when a local Melbourne DJ of the 1960s played the new Ike and Tina Turner single "River Deep Mountain High" it was immediately pulled from the playlist by the station's program manager for being "too noisy and too black".[19]

Renée Geyer is an Australian singer who came to prominence in the mid-1970s, has long been regarded as one of the finest exponents of jazz, soul and R&Bidioms.[20][21] She had commercial success as a solo artist in Australia, with "It's a Man's Man's World "Rock historian, Ian McFarlane described her as having a "rich, soulful, passionate and husky vocal delivery".[20] Geyer's iconic status in the Australian music industry was recognised when she was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame on 14 July 2005.

Parallel with Geyer's success, American born vocalist Marcia Hines emerged as one of Australia's most successful solo singers. She first came to prominence in the early 1970s with critically acclaimed roles in the local stage productions of Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar (in which she was the first African-American to play the role of Mary Magdalene) before launching a solo career. By the late 1970s she was one of Australia's top singing stars, winning several Queen of Pop awards and hosting her own national TV variety series.

Following their initial dissolution in 1982 Cold Chisel lead vocalist Jimmy Barnes embarked on a successful solo career that has continued from the 1980s to the present. Many of Barnes' albums have featured versions of songs from these genres and his chart-topping album Soul Deep (1991) consisted entirely of covers of classic 1960s soul/R&B covers.

Australian soul singer/songwriters like Daniel Merriweather, has after several successful collaborations with artists such as Mark Ronson, released his official debut album, Love & War, in June 2009. It entered the UK Albums Chart at number two. After launching his career as the winner of an early series of Australian Idol, soul singer/songwriter Guy Sebastian has also made an impact on this genre in Australia winning awards at the Urban Music Awards Australia and New Zealand for Best Male Artist and Best R&B Album. Sebastian's recent release "Like it Like That", was the highest selling Australian artist single in 2009 and charted at #1 for two consecutive weeks[22][23]

Lowrider (Australian band) is one of Australia's few IndiePopSoul bands, forming in 2003. Lowrider released their self-titled debut album Lowrider (Illusive Sounds) in 2006 and Diamond Amongst the Thieves (Illusive Sounds) in 2008. In July 2010 Lowrider released Round the World and was nominated for an Australian Music Industry ARIA Music Awards for Best Urban Album. Lowrider found themselves earning high profile support slots over the years for artists including Christina AguileraAlicia KeysJohn LegendLionel RichieLupe Fiasco. In December 2013 Lowrider were the headline act at 'River meets The Bay' music festival on "Channel 7"'s hit series "Home & Away" finale season episode for 2013 playing hit songs including Golden Sun, BeBad & Here We Go .

Among the brightest stars of early Australian rock and roll were Col Joye and Johnny O'Keefe. O'Keefe formed a band in 1956; his hit Wild One made him the first Australian rock'n'roller to reach the national charts.[30] While US and British content dominated airwaves and record sales into the 1960s, local successes began to emerge – notably The Easybeats and the folk-pop group The Seekers had significant local success and some international recognition, while the bands the Bee Gees and AC/DC had their first hits in Australia before going on to international success.

Gordon was also instrumental in launching the career of Johnny O'Keefe, the first Australian rock star, who rose to fame by imitating Americans like Elvis Presley and Little Richard. O'Keefe and other "first wave" bands were popular until about 1961, when a wave of clean-cut family bands took their place.

Though mainstream audiences in the early sixties preferred a clean-cut style – epitomised by the acts that appeared on the Nine Network pop show Bandstand – there were a number of 'grungier' guitar-oriented bands in major cities like Sydney and Melbourne, who were inspired by American and British instrumental and surf acts like Britain's The Shadows – who exerted an enormous influence on Australian and New Zealand music prior to the emergence of The Beatles – and American acts like guitar legend Dick Dale and The Surfaris. Notable Australian instrumental groups of this period included The Atlantics, The Denvermen, The Thunderbirds, The Planets, The Dee Jays, The Joy Boys, The Fabulous Blue Jays and The Whispers.

Jazz was another important influence on the first wave of Australian rock. Unlike the musicians in bands such as The Comets, or Elvis Presley's backing band, who had rockabilly or country music backgrounds, many musicians in Australian rock'n'roll bands – such as Johnny O'Keefe's famous backing group The Dee Jays – had a solid background in jazz.

Many Australian bands and singers tried to enhance their careers by moving overseas, in particular to England, then seen as the mecca of popular music but few bands were successful and of those who relocated to the UK only The Seekers and The Bee Gees (who were actually born and raised in the UK) enjoyed any lasting success. Others that made the journey were The Easybeats (the first rock band to crack the UK market), The Twilights, The Groove, Lloyds World and the La De Das.

The "third wave" of Australian rock began around 1970, by which time most of the major local pop groups of the 1960s had dissolved and former solo stars like Normie Rowe had faded from view. Few acts from this era attained major international success, and it was even difficult to achieve success across Australia, due to low radio airplay and the increasing dominance of overseas performers on the charts. A pivotal event was the 1970 radio ban, which lasted from May to October that year. The Ban was the climax of a simmering "pay for play" dispute between major record companies and commercial radio stations, who refused to pay a proposed new copyright fee for playing pop records on air. The dispute erupted into open conflict in May 1970—many commercial stations boycotted records by the labels involved and refused to list their releases on their Top 40 charts, while the record companies in turn refused to supply radio with free promotional copies of new releases.

Despite commercial radio resistance to the more progressive music being produced by bands like Spectrum and Tully, acts as diverse as AC/DC, Sherbet and John Paul Young were able to achieve major success and develop a unique sound for Australian rock. From 1975, key agents for the increased exposure of local music were the nationally broadcast ABC-TV television pop show Countdown, which premiered in late 1974, and Australia's first non-commercial all-rock radio stationDouble Jay, which opened in January 1975. Hard rock bands AC/DC and Rose Tattoo and harmony rock group Little River Band also found major overseas success in the late 1970s and early 1980s, touring all over the world. Meanwhile, a score of Australian expatriate solo performers like Helen Reddy, Olivia Newton-John and Peter Allen became major stars in the USA and internationally. Icehouse also formed in the late 1970s.

Clubs and venues catering for the demand of live band entertainment flourished in capital cities all over the country, however, the central development of the Australian Music Industry during these years was in Sydney and Melbourne. Clubs such as Chequers, the Bondi Lifesaver and the Coogee Bay Hotel in Sydney, and the Thumpin Tum, Catcher, Berties, Sebastian's, the Hard Rock Cafe and the Q Club in Melbourne were synonymous with the biggest names in Australian Rock & Roll.

In 1970 the first ever outdoor music festival, modelled on Woodstock, was held at Ourimbah near Sydney, and several other followed over the next two years, but most were a financial failure. In 1972 the first festival that proved successful enough to be repeated was the 1972 'Festival' which attracted some 35,000 music fans from across the country to Sunbury, Melbourne.

'Pop' magazines such as Go-Set (which began in 1966), the Daily Planet, RAM, and Juke, and television programs such as Countdown, Uptight, Sounds Unlimited and Happening 70 promoted Australian popular music to a youth market who had never before experienced such media exposure of their idols and stars. 'Pop Stars' were now being created by direct marketing to a targeted teenage audience. Recording studios such as 301, Alberts' and Trafalgar in Sydney and Armstrong Studios and TCS in Melbourne became legendary. Independent label Mushroom Records was founded in 1973 and although it struggled to survive for its first two years of existence, it was saved in early 1975 by the nationawide commercial breakthrough of Skyhooks, whose debut LP became the biggest-selling Australian rock album ever released up to that time; this success enabled Mushroom to become a significant player in the Australian music industry and compete with established companies like EMI, CBS and Festival.

1980s[edit]

The 1980s saw a breakthrough in the independence of Australian rock—Nick Cave said that before the 1980s, "Australia still needed America or England to tell them what was good".[32]Shaddap You Face, by Joe Dolce, became, and still remains, the most successful Australian produced original-song of all time. An example of Australians breaking free from convention came in TISM. Formed in 1982, the band is known for its anonymous members, outrageous stage antics, and humorous lyrics. In the words of the band, "There's only one factor left that makes us work. And that factor, I think, we've burned away, with the crucible of time, into something that's actually genuine."[33]

Much of the success of rock in Australia is attributed to the non-commercial Australian Broadcasting Corporation's radio station Triple J, which focuses heavily on Australian alternative music, and has done so since its formation as 2JJ in 1975.[47] Throughout the station's history, they have helped jump start the careers of numerous bands, through programs such as Unearthed, the Australian Music program Home & Hosed and the Hottest 100.[48] The Big Day Out festival has showcased Australian and international acts, with line-ups spanning multiple genres, with an alternative focus. It has become highly popular amongst musicians; Foo Fighters lead singer Dave Grohl said "We play the Big Day Out because it's the best tour in the world. You ask any band in the world – they all want to play the Big Day Out, every single one of them."[49] Other festivals, such as Homebake, Livid, and Splendour in the Grass, are also rock focused, and together with Big Day Out are "united by the dominant presence of the indie-guitar scene".[50]

Electronic and dance music[edit]

Electronic music in Australia emerged in the 1990s, but takes elements from funk, house, techno, trance and numerous other genres.[52] Early innovators of the genre in Australia include Severed Heads, who formed in 1979 and were the first electronic group to play the Big Day Out.[53] The band achieved long term success, winning an ARIA Award in 2005 for "Best Original Soundtrack" for The Illustrated Family Doctor, where lead singer Tom Ellard said the band would never fit into mainstream music.[54]

FSOM whose members included Davide Carbone, Josh Abrahams and Steve Robbins were also one of the early Australian electronic success stories. They released tracks on Candyline Records. Frank De Wulf's, Two Thumbs Records and Carl Cox's Ultimatum. FSOM also played at several Big Day Out festivals and also supported artists including Bjork, Tricky and The Prodigy. Future Sound of Melbourne won the ARIA Award for "Best Dance Release" for their Chapter One album in 1996.

The Avalanches received widespread acclaim across the globe for their debut album Since I Left You and it has been considered one of the greatest Australian albums ever made.

The genre has developed a wide following, to the point the University of Adelaide offers an Electronic Music Unit, teaching studio production and music technology.[55] The School of Synthesis was also set up in Melbourne by renowned artists including Davide Carbone to specifically cater to Australian Electronic producers. Traditional rock bands such as Regurgitator have developed an original sound by combining heavy guitars and electronic influences,[56] and rock-electro groups, most notably Rogue Traders, have become popular with mainstream audiences.[57][58] The genre is considered to be most popular in Melbourne, with multiple music festivals held in the city.[59] However, Cyclic Defrost, the only specialist electronic music magazine in Australia, was started in Sydney (in 1998) and is still based there.[60][61]Radio still lags somewhat behind the success of the genre—producer and artist manager Andrew Penhallow told Australian Music Online that "the local music media have often overlooked the fact that this genre has been flying the flag for Australian music overseas".[62]

Cut Copy frontman Dan Whitford has attributed the band's success to a change in public attitude as much as the band's quality, explaining "It's a case partly of timing and a growing awareness of electronic music in Australia".[63] Pnau's first album, Sambanova, was released in 1999, at a time when many in Australia considered electronic music to be a dying breed. Nonetheless, the band travelled around the US and Europe, and slowly made a name for themselves, and for a rebirth of electronic music in the country.[64][65]

Individual DJs are also pioneering the electronic music scene globally. Dirty South (DJ) was ranked 59 in the 2009 DJ Mag Top 100 DJ poll. In recent years electronic festivals such as Stereosonic have overtaken other genres of music festivals to have the largest attendance in Australia.

Art music[edit]

Classical music[edit]

The earliest western musical influences in Australia can be traced back to two distinct sources: in the first settlements, the large body of convicts, soldiers and sailors who brought the traditional folk music of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland;[68] and the first free settlers, some of whom had been exposed to the European classical music tradition in their upbringing. Very little music has survived from this early period, although there are samples of music originating from Hobart and Sydney that date back to the early 19th century.[69]

The establishment of choral societies (c. 1850) and symphony orchestras (c. 1890) led to increased compositional activity, although most Australian classical composers of this period worked entirely within European models and many undertook their training in composition in Europe or the United Kingdom. One of the earliest known composers was George Tolhurst, whose oratorio Ruth was the first composed in the then colony of Victoria in 1864. Some works leading up to the first part of the 20th century were heavily influenced by folk music (Percy Grainger's "English Country Gardens" of 1908 being a good example of this).[69] An estimated 10,000 Australians and New Zealanders traveled to Britain each year from the late 1880s to the early 20th century, and the number doubled between the World Wars. A majority was likely female, often a musician; in 1907 one commentator said that Australia's principal exports to Britain were "frozen sheep and pretty-voiced girls". Success in London was often seen as a prerequisite for fame in Australia for singers such as Nellie Melba, Amy Sherwin, and Ada Crossley.[70]

From the time of Australia's Federation in 1901, a growing sense of national identity[71] began to emerge in the arts, although a patriotic attachment with the "mother country"[71] or "Home",[70] that is Britain, and the Empire, continued to dominate musical taste. In the war and post-war eras, as the Australian national identity continued to build, composers looked to their surroundings for inspiration. John Antill in his ballet Corroboree, Peter Sculthorpe and others began to incorporate elements of Aboriginal music, Richard Meale drew influence from south-east Asia (notably using the harmonic properties of the Balinesegamelan), while Nigel Butterley combined his penchant for International modernism with an own individual voice.[69]

Musica Viva Australia, now the largest entrepreneur of chamber music in the world,[104] was founded in 1945 and has provided a major stimulus for public interest in chamber music by organising annual subscription programs of concerts by leading international and Australian ensembles.[105] Further interest has been stimulated by events such as the Australian Festival of Chamber Music[106] which was founded in 1991 and is held each year in Townsville, the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition and the Asia-Pacific Chamber Music Competition, both of which are organised by Chamber Music Australia[107] and held every four years in Melbourne.

Several Australian composers have written chamber works. Among the older composers, Peter Sculthorpe stands out because he has written 17 string quartets up to 2010,[108] with performances in Australia and overseas and recordings by leading groups such as the Kronos Quartet. In the next generation, Brett Dean, himself a violist of note and a composer who has received world-wide recognition, has written several works for various ensembles including a string quartet called "Eclipse" which was commissioned by the Cologne Philharmonie[109] for the Auryn Quartet,[110] a string quintet entitled "Epitaphs" premiered in 2010 at the Cheltenham Music Festival,[111] the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival,[112] La Jolla Music Society|La Jolla SummerFest[113] and the Cologne Philharmonie, and a sonata for violin and piano commissioned by Midori[114] for performance in 2010 in Stockholm and the Wigmore Hall,[115] London. Dean's near-contemporary, Julian Yu[116] has written over 30 works for various chamber ensembles including conventional trios and quartets, as well as unusual combinations such as a quintet for four percussions and piano, a septet for flute, percussion, harp, violin, viola, cello and double bass entitled "Pentatonicophilia", and an unconventional reworking[117] of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition for 16 instruments.

Music broadcasting has played an important role in providing classical music and jazz to the Australian public. Prior to the introduction of FM into the country, the ABC produced classical music programs which were broadcast through their local stations. Professor Alfred Ernest Floyd's program "Music Lover's Hour" was heard for over 25 years, beginning first on the local Melbourne ABC station in 1944 before being broadcast nationally.[119] Pianist and academic Lindley Evans[120] broadcast a series of programs called "Adventures in Music" on the ABC, but was probably better known and more influential through his appearances each Thursday under the pseudonym "Mr Music" on the ABC's national "Argonauts Club" program. Ralph Collins, formerly a record librarian at the ABC with an acute knowledge of music, hosted his own national music program for over 30 years from the early 1960s, and he was eventually nicknamed "Mr Sunday Morning" by the general public. John Cargher, a record retailer, avid collector of records and author of many books, presented two programs. The most popular was "Singers of Renown", which began on the local Melbourne ABC station in 1966 and was transferred by public demand to Radio National at the end of only 10 weeks and remained on air for 42 years. The other program, "Music for Pleasure", began on Radio National in 1967 and continued until 1996.

The national FM music network ABC Classic FM[121] was established in 1976 to broadcast classical music, jazz, operas, recitals and live concerts from Australia and overseas, music analysis programs and news about music activities. Its audience is now estimated as being about one million people,[122] not taking into account a growing number of international users who access its programs via its online service.[123] At about the same time, community not-for-profit FM stations were set up to enable volunteers to produce and present classical music and jazz programs. These included 2MBS FM[124] in Sydney, 3MBS FM[125] in Melbourne and 4MBS Classic FM[126] in Brisbane. More recently a similar station, 5MBS. has been established in Adelaide.

Jazz[edit]

The history of jazz and related genres in Australia extends back into the 19th century. During the gold rush locally formed 'blackface' (white actor-musicians in blackface) minstrel troupes began to tour Australia, touring not only the capital cities but also many of the booming regional towns like Ballarat and Bendigo. Minstrel orchestra music featurics including improvisatory embellishment and polyrhythm in the (pre-classic) banjo playing and clever percussion breaks. Some genuine African-American minstrel and jubilee singing troupes toured from the 1870s. A more jazz-like form of minstrelsy reached Australia in the late 1890s in the form of improvisatory and syncopated coon song and cake-walk music, two early forms of ragtime. The next two decades brought ensemble, piano and vocal ragtime and leading (mostly white) American ragtime artists, including Ben Harney, 'Emperor of Ragtime' Gene Greene and pianist Charlie Straight. Some of these visitors taught Australians how to 'rag' (improvise unsyncopated popular music into ragtime-style music).

By the mid-1920s, phonograph machines, increased contact with American popular music and visiting white American dance musicians had firmly established jazz (meaning jazz inflected modern dance and stage music) in Australia. The first recordings of jazz in Australia are Mastertouch piano rolls recorded in Sydney from around 1922 but jazz began to be recorded on disc by 1925, first in Melbourne and soon thereafter in Sydney.

Soon after World War II, jazz in Australia diverged into two strands. One was based on the earlier collectively improvised called "dixieland" or traditional jazz. The other so-called modernist stream was based on big band swing, small band progressive swing, boogie woogie, and after WWII, the emerging new style of bebop. By the 1950s American bop, itself, was dividing into so-called 'cool' and 'hard' bop schools, the latter being more polyrhythmic and aggressive. This division reached Australia on a small scale by the end of the 1950s. From the mid-1950s rock and roll began to draw young audiences and social dancers away from jazz. British-style dixieland, called Trad, became popular in the early 1960s. Most modern players stuck with the 'cool' (often called West Coast) style, but some experimented with free jazz, modal jazz, experiment with 'Eastern' influences, art music and visual art concept, electronic and jazz-rock fusions.

The 1970s brought tertiary jazz education courses and continuing innovation and diversification in jazz which, by the late 1980s, included world music fusion and contemporary classical and jazz crossovers. From this time, the trend towards eclectic style fusions has continued with ensembles like The Catholics, Australian Art Orchestra, Tongue and Groove, austraLYSIS, Wanderlust, The Necks and many others. It is questionable whether the label jazz is elastic enough to continue to embrace the ever-widening range of improvisatory musics that are associated with the term jazz in Australia. However, mainstream modern jazz and dixieland still have the strongest following and patron still flock to hear famous mainstream artists who have been around for decades, such as One Night Stand players Dugald Shaw and Blair Jordan, reeds player Don Burrows and trumpeter James Morrison and, sometimes, the famous pioneer of traditional jazz in Australia, Graeme Bell.A non-academic genre of jazz has also evolved with a harder "street edge" style. The Conglomerate, The Bamboos, Damage, Cookin on Three Burners, John Mcalls Black Money are examples of this. See: Andrew Bisset. Black Roots White Flowers, Golden Press, 1978 Bruce Johnson. The Oxford Companion to Australian Jazz OUP, 1987 John Whiteoak. Playing Ad Lib: Improvisatory Music in Australia: 1836–1970, Currency Press, 1999

^They won in 1995 for "Big Red Car", in 1996 for "Wake Up Jeff!", in 1998 for "Toot Toot!", in 2005 for "Live Hot Potatoes""History: List of winners". ARIA Awards 2007. Retrieved 2 October 2008. Additionally, the Aria Awards List by performers omits the Wiggles nomination and winning of the award in 2007 for Pop Goes the Wiggles and Racing to the Rainbow in 2006.